What Families Can Learn From Kylie Verzosa’s Heart-to-Heart With Mom Raquel on Almost Honest
In a candid conversation with her daughter, Raquel Verzosa opens up about pageantry, her cancer journey, caring for a loved one with bipolar disorder, and what motherhood looks like once the kids are grown
Kylie Verzosa has made her name in pageantry, showbiz, modeling, and business. These days, she’s also behind the mic as the host of Almost Honest, a podcast about modern womanhood, ambition, and everything in between.
On the November 11 episode, Kylie sat down with someone who knows her best: her mom, Raquel. Raquel and her husband Ari co-founded the advocacy group Mental Health Matters with Kylie. In their conversation, mother and daughter talk about family, Raquel’s own Binibining Pilipinas run, her years as a flight attendant and teacher, and why mental healthMental HealthA person's emotional, psychological, and social well-being, which affects how children and parents think, feel, and cope. Open conversations, regular routines, and timely help from professionals make it easier for has long been their family’s cause.
Here are some moments from the episode that families can take to heart.
1. Sometimes, paths you didn’t plan lead you somewhere good
Pageantry runs in the family. Long before Kylie took home the Miss International 2016 crown, Raquel joined Binibining Pilipinas and made it to the semifinals. In a sweet coincidence, she had the same candidate number that Kylie wore when Kylie first joined the pageant.
Raquel didn’t win a crown, but the experience opened another door. “When I landed as part of the top 15, I think most of us were invited by Philippine Airlines, so we did not have to go through the queue [of the long line of applicants],” she shared.
She ended up as one of only four applicants from her batch who became flight attendants. Looking back, Raquel sees it as the path she needed to take before she became a teacher.
2. Running a family business means leading by example
If you’ve been to Baguio, chances are you’ve heard of Forest House, the restaurant and inn run by Raquel and her family. It has become a go-to for tourists and first-timers in the city.
What keeps people coming back? Raquel credits the whole experience. “When you enter, you get amazed with the ambiance. It’s totally Baguio. When you enter, you’ll be like ‘wow,’” she told Kylie.
What she’s proudest of, though, is the service. She and Ari personally trained new hires themselves. Forest House closed temporarily during the pandemic and has since reopened its doors.
3. Families find creative ways to stay close, even when apart
For the first time, Raquel and Kylie talked on the podcast about Raquel’s thyroid cancer diagnosis. She found out during a checkup last year and went through surgery, then radiation treatment.
“Cancer is cancer,” she said. “The word cancer gives us fear, right?”
Treatment meant time away from her family, and even after she came home, she had to keep her distance for their safety. So Raquel improvised. She set up a Messenger group chat so she could talk with everyone while they ate together in the dining room.
She admits she was scared, but her doctors kept reassuring her. After a month of waiting for results, she got the news she was hoping for. “Kylie, I’m finally cancer-free!”
4. Caregiving takes patience, love, and professional help
The Verzosas were talking about mental healthMental HealthA person's emotional, psychological, and social well-being, which affects how children and parents think, feel, and cope. Open conversations, regular routines, and timely help from professionals make it easier for long before it became a mainstream conversation. Before Kylie began speaking out and co-founding Mental HealthMental HealthA person's emotional, psychological, and social well-being, which affects how children and parents think, feel, and cope. Open conversations, regular routines, and timely help from professionals make it easier for Matters, the family had already been living with Ari’s bipolar disorder.
Raquel has been Ari’s caregiver for 20 years, and she’s honest about what it takes. “You have to be patient; you have to be very understanding. It’s like walking on a tightrope, like, ‘What should I do?’”
Over time, she has learned to give him room. “If he wants space, I give him space.”
Her advice to other caregivers is to talk to people who have been through it, and to be careful with your words. “Communication is not like ‘snap out of it,’” she said. “The communication I’m trying to mention is that you mention that there’s always the love…being pleasant when you talk to them.”
Above all, she encourages families to seek expert support. “What you have to tell them is let’s seek professional help, because healing comes with professional help.” For Raquel, prayer has also been a source of strength.
5. Turn challenges into new beginnings
When the pandemic forced Forest House to close, Raquel and Ari’s first thought was their staff. Their answer was Raquel’s Cuisine by Forest House, a food delivery business.
“I didn’t want my name there but your dad said go use that name because half of the recipes are yours,” she told Kylie, laughing. “We tagged the name Forest House for recall.”
The delivery business is still running even with Forest House back open. These days, Raquel has also taken up arts and crafts, and she sometimes sells her pieces.
6. Moms are protective, and it’s okay to admit when we push too hard
Mother and daughter also got real about their relationship. Raquel explained why moms tend to hold on tight. “We feel that because we are ahead of them, like I’m your mother, I have more life experience, I think I know better. But no. So I’m sorry if at times I push for what I believe in. I realize na hindi pala puwede ‘yun.” (I realize that’s not the way.)
Asked about the best part of being a mom, her answer was simple: her kids. “Being a mommy doesn’t stop when you leave the house. Being a mommy doesn’t stop when you have your own life…it just changes.”
7. Marriage changes everything, but don’t forget yourself
Kylie announced her engagement to her longtime boyfriend, Emil Eriksen, in February of this year, and Raquel had some advice for the bride-to-be.
“It’s no longer you. It’s now both of you. And if you have a family, it’s now the whole family,” she said. “You will have different roles to play, different hats to wear. You may get exhausted, you will be happy.”
Her biggest reminder was self-love. “Self-love because you cannot perform if you’re exhausted, if you want to give up. So do the things that you’re enjoying even if you’re married, even if you have kids.”
Parents, that one’s for us, too.
Frequently Asked Questions
On the November 11, 2026 episode of Almost Honest, Kylie Verzosa and her mother Raquel discussed Raquel’s past Binibining Pilipinas semifinals run, running Forest House in Baguio, surviving thyroid cancer, caring for her husband Ari who has bipolar disorder, and marriage advice ahead of Kylie’s wedding to Emil Eriksen.
Kylie Verzosa co-founded the non-profit advocacy group Mental Health Matters alongside her parents, Raquel and Ari Verzosa. Their advocacy is rooted in their family’s personal experience living with and supporting Ari through bipolar disorder for over 20 years.
Raquel and Ari Verzosa own and operate Forest House, a popular restaurant and inn in Baguio City, as well as Raquel’s Cuisine by Forest House, a food delivery business launched during the pandemic to keep their staff employed.
More on mom and daughter relationships
The Health Talk Every Mom and Daughter Should Be Having
When Mothers and Daughters Become Mirrors: Understanding Mother-Daughter Envy
What Daughters Learn From Watching Their Mothers
